September 13, 2011

Covington's Egan to Become Facebook's New D.C. Privacy Guru

A co-chairwoman of Covington & Burling’s global privacy and data security practice will move to Facebook Inc. in mid-October, the social networking website announced Tuesday.

Erin Egan, who joined Covington in 1996, will serve as senior policy adviser and director of privacy for Facebook in Washington. At Covington, she has represented several media and technology companies, including Facebook and Microsoft Corp.

Egan referred inquiries to Facebook spokesman Andrew Noyes. The spokesman said in a statement that adding the Covington partner is part of an effort by the company to show its commitment to protecting the more than 750 million Facebook users.

“It's imperative that we scale our policy team so that we have the resources in place to demonstrate to policymakers that we are industry leaders in privacy, data security and safety,” Noyes said.

Facebook spent $550,000 on federal lobbying during the first half of 2011, according to congressional records. The company lobbied on several issues, including matters related to online security and privacy.

Egan, who made The American Lawyer’s “45 Under 45” list this year of top young women attorneys, put together Covington’s global privacy and data security practice, which has more than 30 lawyers.

At the law firm, she has advised clients on several Internet-related matters, including spyware, e-mail marketing and data security breach issues.